


happiness: a question

by bravely (commovente)



Series: iwaoi week june 2015 [2]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, and gets really hecka emotional over said photos (but mostly about oikawa), in which iwa-chan takes photos (mostly of oikawa), like diabetes inducing sweetness you have been warned
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-09
Updated: 2015-06-09
Packaged: 2018-04-03 14:46:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4104757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/commovente/pseuds/bravely
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p></p><blockquote>
  <p>hanamaki: good goin’, iwaizumi</p>
  <p>hanamaki: didn’t know you actually had it in you — i’m actually sort of proud</p>
  <p>hanamaki: and incredibly disgusted</p>
</blockquote>or, 'why you should never submit things to photography competitions drunk out of your mind': a life lesson by iwaizumi hajime
            </blockquote>





	happiness: a question

**Author's Note:**

> written for day 2 of iwaoi week!!
> 
> prompt: selfies
> 
> (but how does this even happen in real life andrea, you might ask? well you see --- )

Iwaizumi finds out from Hanamaki first; the three short, staccato notes indicating new messages in their group chat with Matsukawa and Oikawa.

 

> _hanamaki: good goin’, iwaizumi_
> 
> _hanamaki: didn’t know you actually had it in you — i’m actually sort of proud_
> 
> _hanamaki: and incredibly disgusted_
> 
>  

Iwaizumi blinks, not the slightest clue of what the hell Hanamaki’s yammering about this time. Although, anything that makes the latter proud (Iwaizumi carefully ignores the third message) suggests quite strongly that whatever it is Iwaizumi’s done — or Hanamaki thinks he’s done, Iwaizumi’s been a scapegoat before — is not, in fact, anything to be proud of. _Ping!_ Another message — Matsukawa, this time.

 

 

> _matsukawa: ;))_
> 
> _hanamaki: right, mattsun?_
> 
> _matsukawa: right, makki_
> 
> _matsukawa: reach for the stars, iwaizumi_
> 
> _matsukawa: ;) ;) ;)_
> 
>  
> 
>  

Okay, so something’s definitely up. Mentally running through the last few days, Iwaizumi tries to peg whatever it is his two dumbass friends were talking about now. Was it he and Oikawa turning up to their practice match in each others’ jerseys (again) yesterday? It couldn’t be, seeing as how that only happened because Hanamaki had switched them in their bags himself before they changed, the jackass. And it’s definitely not the fact that he let Oikawa out of their apartment yesterday in mismatched socks (pink and green pinstripes on the left, a sickly lime argyle on the right) which were excruciatingly, embarrassingly visible with shorts; Iwaizumi’s already trained himself not to notice (very much) Oikawa’s myriad of Area-51 related shirts. So, it couldn’t be that.

Sighing with the heaviness of a man facing much more than positing a casual inquiry to two of his closest friends, Iwaizumi sends a message and resigns himself to his fate.

 

 

> _iwaizumi: ????_
> 
>  

Their replies are almost immediate.

 

> _hanamaki: oh, you_
> 
> _matsukawa: they grow up so fast, don’t they_
> 
> _hanamaki: tiny, angry ace one day, photographic revolutionary the next_
> 
> _matsukawa: i think i’m going to cry_

 

The word ‘photographic’ makes Iwaizumi pause. He carefully reads through the messages, then scrolls up and reads them again. A terrible, sinking revelation begins to build in the depths of his gut.

 

> _hanamaki: well well iwaizumi? what have you got to say for yourself?_

 

Opening up a new tab, Iwaizumi pulls up their college website, clicking onto his faculty page. Taking up media as his primary major, Iwaizumi’s also dabbled a little with photography on the side, but. Considering the rest of the people in his faculty, he’s hardly the most innovative, avant-garde guy around. Or so he tells himself, thinly veiled desperation breaking through in his trembling fingers as he waits for the page to load.

 

> _matsukawa: yeah, iwaizumi, what have you got to say for yourself?_
> 
> _matsukawa: …iwa-chan???_

 

The page loads, revealing the results of the recent faculty-wide photography competition Iwaizumi’d sent a collection to. It was a compulsory part of his portfolio, after all — compiling a collection revolving around a central theme, and the ability to say he had, in fact, sent it in for publication somewhere, unsuccessful though his valiant efforts and been. Or so the story is supposed to go.

First place apparently went to some chick Iwaizumi’s seen around campus, always armed with a camera, camera bag and tripod not far behind. Heaving a sigh of relief, Iwaizumi feels a great burden lifted from his shoulders, shooting a quick, grateful prayer to the powers that be for spying neither his name nor his photos anywhere on the placing submissions. Ready to close the case after all, he’s about to switch to another tab and rid himself a suspicious, inexplicably guilty conscience, until —

— hold up one damn second. Scrolling fast enough to momentarily freeze his browser, Iwaizumi scrolls to the very end of the page, labeled simply “highly commended” (who even adds one of those, he thinks bitterly, isn’t that what second and third and fourth place were for?).

And there, lo and behold, lies a very familiar name next to a decidedly unfamiliar collection title. _“happiness: a question”_ it reads, and Iwaizumi scrolls through the comments, taking note of very little, skimming haphazardly through phrases like “very candid and almost confessional” and “poetically captioned”, growing exponentially more worried at the sight of turns of phrase like, “personal but no less relatable for their insight into the photographer’s life”.

“Poignant and heartwarming, a true effort,” the paragraph concludes, and Iwaizumi for the life of him tries to recall why it is that he can’t seem to remember:

a) what his collection is even about;

b) what he’d captioned each photo with; and

c) who the hell gives a title like _“happiness: a question”_ anyway?

Dimly, he recalls frantically trying to throw together what little photos he _did_ have the night before submissions were due, mumbling “it’s only worth fifteen percent” and “it’s not even the entire portfolio” like a mantra, even as he scrambled for something to submit. Looking back on that night, he didn’t really try very hard in resisting Oikawa’s wheedles to _go out and party, see the world, or maybe a drunken new colour, Iwa-chan! Live a little_! before coming home close to three in the morning and scribbling whatever the hell beneath the title and caption spaces before carelessly shoving them into a manila folder and promptly falling asleep on it.

Clicking on the hyperlinked collection name, Iwaizumi scrolls through the collection for all of five seconds before closing the browser completely. Pulling the group chat back up, Iwaizumi types simply:

 

> _iwaizumi: not one fucking word_
> 
> _iwaizumi: i don’t even know how you guys know about this, anyway_

 

A beat, then:

 

> _matsukawa: oh iwaizumi, who do you think even got you and oikawa a cab home, anyway_
> 
> _hanamaki: it was the least we could do, you wax so romantic when drunk, right mattsun_
> 
> _matsukawa: right makki_
> 
> _matsukawa: good times, good times_

 

A vein twitches distantly above Iwaizumi’s left eyebrow, and if anyone were to ask him at that moment, it’s that he’d blame for opening the browser and pulling back up that damned collection again, scrutinising it properly. Never has Iwaizumi been more grateful for his and Oikawa’s different class schedules as he picks apart each photo, cursing the inebriated, frayed threads of his memories for looking so — so — _similar,_ replicated almost identically on the slightly grainy resolution of his desktop screen.

 

 

**_“happiness: a question” by Iwaizumi Hajime._ **

 

**_the heart: a hypothesis_ **

The photo’s a side-profile portrait of Oikawa, that much is obvious. But it doesn’t take a particularly perceptive eye to notice the angle it was taken from allows sunbeams to fall across Oikawa’s face, head thrown back in laughter; streams of light filtering almost through the page, as if the fractals of brightness decorating Oikawa’s silhouette were stuck on the image afterwards, the photographer’s afterthought of a well-remembered sunny afternoon.

Iwaizumi remembers taking this photo, a couple years ago. Their second year of high school, if he recalls correctly, the day after their second Spring High; runner-up at the finals for the nth time, just shy of stealing even a single victory of Ushijima and Shiratorizawa. Oikawa hadn’t bothered hiding his hurt this time around, unlike the year before — there was no masked pain, no tangled palette of physical exhaustion dominated by shattered expectation and well-worn, tattered dreams — only sadness, resigned and just the slightest bit blank, like Oikawa had poured all he had to give into the tears and sweat of that match and now he didn’t quite know how he was supposed to respond; Iwaizumi briefly — bitterly — considering that it’s just as well they didn’t win, after all. A stolen victory would be no better than a half-hearted apology, a cast-off consolation prize to someone who worked no less, maybe even harder, than any first-place team with a long history of national rankings.

It was a silent bus ride back to the gym, then the wordless pull of Oikawa’s collar away from the full bins of volleyballs, the screech of Iwaizumi’s sneakers as he tugged and the squeak of Oikawa’s shoes as he resisted intermingling with the natural soundtrack of whispered breezes and distant conversation on their way home. He’d given up eventually, though, stopped resisting and started pulling his own weight along next to Iwaizumi, and somehow that hurt even more than the brief, blurred snapshot of Oikawa’s — _their_ — loss just hours prior, so he’d tugged at Oikawa, gripping his wrist this time as he directed them toward the pond a couple blocks down from the park near their houses.

Pretended the soft underside of Oikawa’s wrist didn’t pick through the scales of his heart, wedging itself firmly at its centre, that untouched chamber Iwaizumi doesn’t think anyone else knows how to access except Oikawa. Without even trying, at that, when three years later and Iwaizumi’s still trying to figure out how it is that Oikawa can take control of his heart like that, swipe away at Iwaizumi’s composure like it had always been Oikawa’s to mould to begin with.

And maybe, Iwaizumi thinks, it always has.

Oikawa had stopped walking once they reached the pond’s banks, but Iwaizumi had continued walking, wading through sediment and mud and water like it was no different from the ground beneath his feet, pulling a harsh, high-pitched laugh out of Oikawa, unbidden as they squelched to a halt in the middle of the pond. Ripples of water settled all around them, wrapping their legs in a perimeter of transient motion. Above their heads, clouds gravitated towards the horizon, even the weather giving them this single, secluded second to breathe to themselves.

And Oikawa had, inhaling light and air till he was full, expelling the excess in crinkled eyelids and bursting laughter; Iwaizumi grinning so hard at the sight it hurt, reaching absent-mindedly, unthinkingly for the camera still slung around his shoulders from the bus home — borrowed for the night from one of the first years recording matches so he and Oikawa could review them later. Oikawa to sate the compulsive, pressing need to pull apart his opponents and break down his own motives, as visible as they could be on a laptop screen; Iwaizumi to assuage the habitual, now instinctive desire to make sure Oikawa falls asleep before he does after matches. Preferably before midnight so Iwaizumi can spend a few hours before dawn smoothing away the furrows on his brow, hoping it wipes away any nightmares like the ripples on the pond-water, already disappeared from all but their memories.

He stumbles upon the memory and the photograph both now, clarity blurred by the boundaries of current technology but not diluted of any of its residual warmth. It’s a candid shot, Iwaizumi thinks, framing the tips of an on-screen cowlick with the tips of his fingers, briefly considering what else an outsider would see in the openness Oikawa’s smile as he clicks onto the next image.

 

**_wishbones: a catalyst_ **

Cringing at the caption, Iwaizumi slides his gaze back up to the photo, fingers jolting in disbelief at the sight, accidentally zooming to the next photo.

Iwaizumi clicks it back.

This one’s two years after the first photo was taken, and a year before Iwaizumi finds himself faced with it again today. It was also, incidentally, the night Iwaizumi had told Oikawa he loved him, gasped between drunken, open-mouthed kisses and repeated every night, sober, since, between warm skin and shared sheets.

The photo captures Oikawa, again, but this time Iwaizumi’s in it, too — a dead giveaway that he was not, in fact, the one to take this particular shot. _What the hell,_ Iwaizumi ponders, _is this photo even allowed?_

But apparently it is, because here he is — academic record unblemished by plagiarism or other intellectual property stolen by proxy — and there the shot stands, corny, vaguely nonsensical caption and all.

Iwaizumi has his eyes squeezed shut in the image, which Iwaizumi remembers being caused by Matsukawa’s alarming propensity for dirty jokes recited in public places at full volume, Iwaizumi laughing so hard his breathlessness translated onto the image in a broad grin that tugs on his cheekbones, eyelids smooth if slightly dark and dusky from lack of sleep. His arm’s slung around Oikawa’s shoulder, leaning into the other like he could project some of that unrestrained happiness through osmosis via Oikawa’s thin cotton shirt and jutted shoulder blades.

Oikawa, however, is looking straight at Iwaizumi, fingers clasped tightly together it’s sort of miraculous in and of itself that Iwaizumi can’t hear his knuckles clacking together, can’t smoothen the skin pinched into the tightly clenched folds. His face is slack, though, lips parted slightly, a shine in his eyes that screams unabashed wanting as he drinks in Iwaizumi’s expression instead of the untouched drink in front of him. His shoulders, the tip of his spine, everywhere touched by Iwaizumi’s arm is easy and relaxed; neither he nor Oikawa are looking anywhere near the camera.

Iwaizumi’s not even sure who took the photo, actually, only knows that the two of them together make an almost textbook-definition diagram for the intensity of longing, set to a backdrop of patterned lanterns stuck to a wall, leaving a pulsing, residual effect on the borders of the photo.

 _Embarrassing_ doesn’t come anywhere close to encapsulating Iwaizumi’s sentiments towards the fact that this photo exists, visual evidence of some young adult, chick flick pining for all the world to see.

“What the fuck,” Iwaizumi breathes, mindful not to press the ‘next’ button accidentally again.

Then he says, “do I still have this photo somewhere…?” with a half of mind to rummage for it before filing it carefully into, like, a journal or something, even though he knows for a fact he’d be ten times more likely to burn the damn thing than take any measures in preserving it.

Catching himself halfway through this thought, Iwaizumi repeats, “what the fuck,” before aggressively clicking onto the next photo.

 

_**love: a logical conclusion** _

This photo makes Iwaizumi ache.

There’s not really any other, nicer way of phrasing it; no rose-tinted murmurs or soft, sweet nothings; not even Iwaizumi’s most succinct, choice swears come nowhere close in breaching the depth of — of — _ache_. He supposes dryly that his former presumption had been incorrect — this picture stirs something far closer to want in Iwaizumi than the second picture ever could. It jangles his ribs, positions and re-positions them, glossing over not an empty space next to his heart, exactly, but where usually, a surplus of warmth, of heart from someone _else_ , resides. His fist clenches at the left side of his chest, like he could physically grasp the memory of Oikawa into something tangible, fit it inside himself like a puzzle piece; anything to stop the sensation of absence, of swiping your tongue over a lost tooth as a child like by doing it repeatedly enough you could fill the gap by sheer will.

Irrationally, Iwaizumi feels heat and want and Oikawa stir into something indistinguishable in his chest, berates himself for getting so — so — emotional over a picture he took of one of the countless times he and Oikawa held hands. Granted, he’s pretty sure this particular photo is less “let’s hold hands and go on a date” holding hands and more of “we just had sex and there’s nowhere else, literally or figuratively, I’d rather leave our twined fingers than your bare chest” kind of holding hands.

Because that’s what the picture is: his fingers tangled between Oikawa’s, splayed languidly across the left side of Oikawa’s chest (Oikawa’s _heart_ , the previously unknown, sentimental section of Iwaizumi’s brain helpfully supplies), taken diagonally in a manner that suggests Iwaizumi’d not risen any further than onto a single elbow to take the shot, the photo’s borders framing the upper half of Oikawa’s ribs, teasing flashes of collarbone and the upward slant of his neck, ending in a rippled puddle of their sheets obscuring the rest of Oikawa’s chest and everything below. A fact for which Iwaizumi is eternally grateful for, on two levels — one, nobody else needs to see Oikawa _like that_ , for any reason; and also, the rustled, post-coital state of their sheets obscures the _Return of the Apes_ bedspread Iwaizumi will swear on what’s left of his rapidly diminishing dignity he didn’t buy for himself, nope, Oikawa’s the resident nerd over here.

Closer inspection, however, reveals what might be the the beginnings of a 3d-stylised “R”. He’d also apparently slapped a filter onto the picture at some forgotten period of time afterwards, unless their bedroom’s walls rendered themselves temporarily violet instead of the usual probably-navy-but-definitely-dark-blue to accommodate their glow in the dark, model solar system stuck across the ceiling, allowing for maximum, well, glowing in the dark.

Iwaizumi winces.

But at least now he can say for certain that he took this photo, though he can’t precisely recall the when of it. Within the last year, definitely, given the photograph’s context. He stares at it for a little while longer, drinking in the sight of broad shoulders and skin, runs a finger down defined collarbones on the screen. Were anyone to walk in on him just then, he’d probably look like a massive pervert, but. The moment comes and goes, not a single unauthorised intruder in sight, so Iwaizumi figures his…preferences?…are safe.

At least, for now.

The stirring inside him now is distinctly separate from the emotional mess of before; it’s not even located remotely near his chest anymore, for God’s sake, being distinctly. Well, lower than that. Iwaizumi swallows, quickly clicking ‘next’ before he has to deal with any repercussions a boner he absolutely does not want to attend to implies.

The next couple of pictures follow much the same vein — broadcasting way more about his inordinate Oikawa-fixation and his tendency to, as Hanamaki had said, “wax romantic” about, well, Oikawa.

Sparing a quick glance at the time, Iwaizumi figures he has time for probably one more photograph before the subject of his embarrassingly honest collection comes home. Skimming through the rest of the photos, he settles for the last one, mostly drawn to the caption. Which, Iwaizumi thinks, far and away takes the cake for most mortifying caption of the lot. It reads, almost unbelievably:

 

**_tooru: the answer_ **

 

Perhaps even more unbelievable is the photograph itself. It is, for want of a better term, a selfie; the slightly-better-than-grainy resolution suggesting it was taken by someone else — otherwise meaning: Iwaizumi himself — using a phone’s front camera.

Like the first photo, it’s a portrait of Oikawa, facing Iwaizumi properly this time. His smile is small and clear and knowing, reflecting his unmarred complexion from a summer spent in Miyagi and away from homework, Iwaizumi remembers now, at the beginning of this year before they went back to Tokyo for their second year of college.

He’s got a bunch of sunflowers bundled up in his arms, his eyes dark and almost black in comparison. The photo goes a little fuzzy around the edges, partially from shitty phone camera quality, mostly from Iwaizumi’s own trembling hands as he’d snapped the shot.

 _Oikawa’s really embarrassing,_ he remembers thinking when Oikawa had scooped the flowers into a bouquet, laughing rich and warm as he says, “why don’t you take a photo, already, I know you want to —“ indicating Iwaizumi’s fingers already reflexively digging through his pocket for his phone, “— and the flowers look nice, too, so.”

Before then going on to look Iwaizumi dead in the eyes as he says, “Also. Will you buy me flowers like these when we get married, Iwa-chan?”

Iwaizumi’d taken the shot in his disbelief anyway, nodding dumbly as he did, a mumbled “sure…” skimming past his teeth.

Oikawa’d brightened up even more at that, more luminescent than the damn sunflowers, beaming like he was sunshine incarnate himself, and Iwaizumi will never confess aloud he’s always thought Oikawa is. The sun, that is. And his moon and his stars.

Just everything, really.

“I love you,” Oikawa blurts out as Iwaizumi holds down to take another photo, one he definitely knows he still has, printed small and slipped into his wallet without Oikawa’s knowledge, _I love you_ ingrained in his memory and on his person wherever he goes.

From the front of the apartment, Iwaizumi hears a key slide into place, front door gliding out of the way to project Oikawa’s announcement of “I’m home!” without disruption.

“Iwa-chan,” Oikawa smiles, poking a head into their bedroom. He’s got a cowlick over his forehead, probably blown along by the wind. Iwaizumi wants to smooth it away with his lips. Wants to kiss the rest of Oikawa while he’s at it.

Instead, he says, “Welcome home.”

Walking forward to meet Oikawa halfway, he scoops Oikawa into his arms, grabbing his phone and keys to set on the bedside table while Oikawa laughs. He pauses when he sees the picture attached to Oikawa’s set of keys as a keychain, amazed to see a photo of himself, phone in hand and beaming, photographic evidence of Iwaizumi as he takes a photo of Oikawa.

Maybe even that last selfie from _“happiness: a question”_.

“Iwa-chan?” Oikawa’s face pops back into his vision, having ducked around to see what Iwaizumi was looking at. “Ah,” he says, spotting the photo, “I snapped _that_ when —“

Except Iwaizumi never does find out when, because his mouth had already ducked down to kiss Oikawa’s still parted lips.

 

_**bonus:** _

The previous Seijou third years’ group chat pings, three short, staccato notes signalling the arrival of new messages.

 

> _iwaizumi: i feel like i’ve just gone through a journey of self-discovery_
> 
> _matsukawa: gross_
> 
> _oikawa: iwa-chan!!!_
> 
>  

**Author's Note:**

> i'm laughing endlessly over how corny my entries are shaping up to be tbh.
> 
> thanks for reading guys :'))


End file.
